Chapter Text
The first time Satoru Gojo mentioned his fiancée, it was a lie. It was a beautiful, desperate, spur of the moment—lie. The kind of lies that tasted of sake and poor life choices. But his mother corned him on the New Year's gathering, that familiar glint in her eyes as she spoke.
"Satoru, dear, I've arranged for you to meet the Nakamura heiress next week. She's lovely, accomplished, and her family's cursed technique would complement ours beautifully—"
"I'm engaged."
The words were out before he could even calculate the fallout. Honestly, it was the easiest path.
His mother's teacup paused halfway to her lips. Silence followed as the room quieted. She simply stared. "...To whom?"
Satoru's brain fired through a list of names, discarding them instantly. He needed a shield—someone strong enough to withstand his family, someone respectable enough to be believable, and someone he knew well enough to lie about.
The answer came before common sense could intervene. "Utahime Iori."
The entire room—aunts, uncles, and distant cousins who only appeared once a year to judge him—went dead silent. Not because Utahime was a household name to them, but because the "Strongest" had finally been tethered.
Satoru leaned into it, his smile turning effortless and charming. "She's a Grade 1 sorcerer. Very accomplished. We've been... discreet." he paused and added, "For the past two years."
It was perfect. He could easily stage a "heartbreaking" breakup in a few months. He was difficult, after all; Utahime frequently reminded him he was an arrogant brat. People would buy the tragedy. And if his family needed proof of the argument, he could easily bait Utahime into yelling at him. She did it nearly every time she saw him. Not that she was going to meeting his family anytime soon.
His father, a man who usually communicated in varying degrees of silence, gave a slow, measured nod. "The Iori family is respectable. Bring her to dinner next month."
Satoru didn't flinch. He just nodded, his smile fixed. He wasn't thinking about how to convince her. He wasn't thinking about the next thirty days. He was already drafting the excuses for why he'd eventually show up to dinner alone.
That was four weeks ago.
Satoru hadn't mentioned Utahime's name once since that night. He had operated on a policy of blissful denial—until he realized that "next month" was tonight.
He found her in an empty classroom at Kyoto Jujutsu High, the late afternoon sun casting long, orange shadows over stacks of ungraded papers.
"Do you prefer round or emerald cut diamonds?" Satoru asked, popping into her personal space without a hint of greeting.
Utahime didn't even look up from her red pen. "What?"
"I may have told my family we're getting married."
"WHAT—" Utahime's voice spiked, but she caught herself, taking a sharp breath and returning to her grading. "No. Whatever scheme you're cooking up, I want no part of it. Get out, Gojo."
"I need you to pretend to be my fiancée. Just for tonight."
"No."
"I'll owe you."
"No."
"I'll do your paperwork for a year. All of it. Even the stuff for the higher-ups."
"No."
"I'll never call you 'Utahime' in that smug voice you hate again."
"No."
"I'll behave."
That actually made her stop. She looked up, her expression flat. "Now I know you're lying."
Satoru didn't argue. Instead, he placed a small velvet box on her desk and flicked the lid open. The scratch of her pen died. Utahime stared at the ring. It was obscene—a four-carat, brilliant-cut diamond set in a platinum band that looked like it cost more than the Kyoto campus's yearly maintenance budget.
"What is that?" she asked quietly.
"My family thinks I'm engaged... to you," Satoru said, leaning forward, his palms flat on her desk. "I may have implied we've been secretly dating for two years."
Utahime stood up so fast her chair screeched against the floorboards and hit the wall. "You what? You told the most powerful clan in the country that we're engaged? The woman you've spent the last decade tormenting?"
"To be fair, I torment everyone equally."
"This is insane. Tell them you made a mistake. Tell them you were drunk. Tell them I died!"
"They've already started planning an engagement party," he admitted, wincing. "My mother is actually excited. She's never approved of anyone, but she thinks you're perfect. Something about 'strong cursed energy' and 'good breeding stock'—her words, not mine."
Utahime's eye twitched violently. "I am not breeding stock."
"Obviously. But please, Utahime. Just for dinner. We can break it off tonight. You can yell at me. We can have a grand argument, and you can call off the wedding. Easy peasy."
She crossed her arms, her gaze flickering from the ring to Satoru's uncharacteristically pleading face. "What's in it for me?"
"Anything. Name it."
"New training equipment for my students. Higher-end stuff, none of that refurbished junk."
"Done."
"A raise. A significant one."
"I'll fund it out of my personal account."
"An apology," she said, her voice dropping an octave. "For every single time you've called me 'weak' in the last ten years."
The room went quiet. Satoru paused. "That's... several hundred apologies."
"Then we don't have a deal."
"Fine! Fine," he sighed, throwing his hands up. "I apologize. Profusely. For all of it. I'll even put it in writing."
Utahime let out a breath that sounded like she was expelling a curse. She picked up the ring, the diamond catching the dying light of the sun, and slipped it onto her finger. It fit perfectly.
"I hate you," she whispered.
"I know."
"This is going to be a disaster, Satoru."
"Probably."
"Don't make me regret this."
He let a grin slip—a real one this time. "Have I ever made you regret anything?"
"Yes. Constantly. For the past decade."
"...Fair point."
Utahime stared at the ring on her finger. It was heavier than it looked. It looked... wrong. Far too real.
"Satoru," she said, her voice dropping as she stared at the brilliance on her hand. "This ring feels... real."
Satoru looked at her, his expression one of genuine confusion. "It is real."
Utahime's eyes widened, her breath hitching. "What?"
"I can't put a fake ring on your finger and then show you to my mother, Utahime," he said, as if she were the one being slow. "She'd know in a heartbeat. The Gojo family doesn't do 'cubic zirconia'."
"This is real—" She shook her head violently, panic rising in her chest as she scrambled to tug the platinum band off her knuckle. "I can't wear this! Satoru, this is insane!"
Satoru rolled his eyes, leaning back against a student's desk with an exasperated sigh. "Put it back on. It's a tool for a job. You can sell it, auction it off afterward, throw it into the ocean for all I care. I don't want it back."
"You don't want—Satoru, this ring probably cost more than I make in six months!" she hissed, holding the piece of jewelry like it was a live grenade. "How much did you spend on a temporary engagement ring?"
He just grinned at her, that infuriating, shark-like sparkle in his eyes. "Nope."
"Satoru!"
"Not telling."
They argued for nearly thirty minutes. Utahime was appalled, her moral compass spinning wildly at the thought of wearing a small fortune on her finger just to lie to a group of elderly sorcerers. Satoru, meanwhile, seemed bored by the concept of money entirely. Eventually, exhausted and realizing the sun was setting, she slipped the ring back onto her finger with a shaky exhale.
Satoru clapped his hands together, the sound echoing in the quiet classroom. "Perfect! See? It looks great on you."
"I hate everything about this," she muttered.
"Right, right. Now, I'll pick you up at seven. I already left a dress in your apartment—"
Utahime froze. "How did you get into my apartment—"
"—so be ready!" He didn't answer her, simply finishing his own sentence with a jaunty wave. Before she could throw a stapler at his head, he vanished, the space where he had been standing suddenly empty, leaving Utahime alone with a ring that cost a fortune and a looming dinner with the most powerful family in Japan.